Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Embroidered Portrait of McKenna & Grace

Can I just say that I'm probably the best sister ever? Because it's true. Haha. This is a picture of my sister McKenna (on the left) and her friend Grace at their freshman homecoming a few months ago. Well, this weekend, McKenna realized she still needed a gift for Grace and had no money. I offered to make a pocket friend, and instead, McKenna had me do a portrait. Which takes a LOT more time, not to mention skill. Oh, and patience. Up until this point, I've just been doing sketches, nothing completely finalized. But Kenna needed the gift in a few days, so I put on my safety goggles (Did I mention I wear safety goggles when I sew? Haha, I'll explain later.*) and went to work.

This is made doing free motion machine embroidery, which means I'm using a sewing machine, but moving the hoop around myself (as compared to having a computer move it around). So there's a lot of opportunity for mistakes, and with such tiny stitches (most of the time) it's almost better to start over than try to rip them out. So I really have to be patient and take my time. This piece has 5 different colors of thread (which means changing the bobbin all the time) on symphony broadcloth, stretched on an 8" wooden embroidery hoop lined with purple ribbon.

Here's how it turned out!

Faces.

Texture.

Tight little stitches.

Ribbon.

This seems dorky, but I get really excited when I can sign my name on something. I mean, you can't really sign animations, and I'm really apprehensive about calling something art/worthy of being signed. I guess. But I figured I might as well go for it.

There are a lot of things I would have liked to fix, but it's pretty difficult, not to mention time consuming, to rip those stitches out, and I wasn't getting paid (like I said, best sister ever). I'm going to try to do a few more finished pieces and sketch some more. And when I put up my Etsy shop (another one of my projects for break) I'm going to have listings for custom embroidery portraits. I just need to figure out a few logistics first.

Luckily, Grace really liked this, and I've gotten a lot of great feedback. I'm hoping the same is true when I finish this next one. Hahaha, I can't wait to show you!